Responsibility is Important
by Muffyn1
Summary: After an accident involving a possessed musket, Sunnydale High School hires a new American history teacher, but everyone in Sunnydale knows that 75% of the time, teachers are demons. Or Technopagans. Or giant praying mantises. The point is, teachers on the Hellmouth are usually evil. Takes place during the first half of season 3, after "Faith, Hope, and Trick" before "The Zeppo".
1. Teaser

**Unfortunately, I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer or any of the characters, backgrounds, plots, or mythology associated with it. All that belongs to our Lord Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy Productions. Grr Arrg. I do own this story, though, so no stealy stealy. Not that you would. Right? The cover of this story was also made by me, designed by me, drawn by me, and is mine, okay? Not that it's that impressive...it took me three minutes. Anyway, enjoy! Also review. And favorite. And follow. Am I being too pushy? I think I'm being pushy. Just...enjoy.**

**Responsibility is Important  
By Muffyn1**

Once upon a time there was a-

-wait a sec, that opening is, like, way too fairytale-like to begin any story involving my life.

In the annoyingly vampire-infested town of Sunnydale, which lay on top of a Hellmouth, a hangout spot for supernatural baddies and the beginning point of many narrowly avoided apocalypses (or is it apocalypsi?), Buffy Summers (that's me) sat inside her house.

There. That's better.

She sat on her bed, staring at her homework. Not doing it, just staring at it. But she wasn't thinking about anything either. She was just kinda spacing out, since, usually, when she wasn't worrying about school she was worrying about preventing an apocalypse, but, tonight, there was no apocalypse to prevent.

Unfortunately, there was school to worry about.

She blinked and focused on her history homework. And then she looked at the clock. And then she looked at her pillow.

Buffy's harder-than-usual homework was probably due to the fact that Sunnydale High School had hired a new, stricter teacher after the last American history teacher, Mr. Chomsky, had perished in an accident involving an eighteenth century musket replica during a field trip to a museum (to be fair, the musket was possessed).

Buffy's harder-than-usual homework also made her want to sleep. And, so, that's what she did. She put her homework on her desk and decided she would find the time to do it before history class the next morning. Maybe she'd even get Willow's help.

-x-

"No."

"Why not?!" Buffy asked, exasperated at her friend's unwillingness to help her.

"Buffy, you have to learn to be responsible. I can't just let you copy off my homework all the time." Willow explained as they walked towards the library.

Buffy stared at Willow with sad eyes and said, "Hey! I haven't copied your homework in, like, a month! And me? Irresponsible? Hello!? Slayer! Y'know, slayer responsibility. Killing demons and whatever? Also, the world's not over yet so I think I've pretty much been living up to those responsibilities."

"Because last summer totally wasn't you running away from your responsibilities, right?" said Willow, before Buffy gave her a dark look, "And, hey, I know for a fact that Giles gave you the night off last night. He said for Faith to do the patrolling thing, so you had no reason not to do your homework." Willow scolded.

Buffy pouted, "But Will! I wanted to sleep! I was tired and stuff! Come on! This teacher doesn't know that I'm..."

"Irresponsible yet?" Willow finished for her as they stepped into the library, "Sorry. Looks like you're gonna have to face my wrath."

"Willow wrath? Uh oh." Xander said as he looked up from the book he was reading.

Buffy was shocked, "Xander? Here this early? And reading? What happened?"

"I just thought I'd actually do my history homework for once. Of course, I didn't know anything so I came here and asked Giles for a history book. But, like, the textbook kind. Not the old, torn, read-a-passage-and-summon-a-demon kind." Xander replied.

"You did your history homework? Can I see it?" Buffy pleaded.

"Oh," Xander said, "uh, well, no. I ended up not finishing. Or starting. What's the point of textbooks explaining things if you need explanations of the things it's explaining? So, I'm guessing me and the Buffster are both going to be facing the new guy's wrath today?"

"Mr. Irving?" Willow said, "I like him. He's nice."

Buffy laughed, "Will, we've had him for one class and you don't even need slayer senses to tell that they guy is pure evil!" they looked at her, serious for a moment and she quickly mended, "It was a joke. He's only as evil as any of the other old people that try to shove us into this Hell we are forced to call school."

"Try and fail," Xander pointed out, "that's what cutting's for. Also, I heard that Irving gave some kids detention for not doing their homework yesterday."

"Oh. Great." Buffy whined.

Xander through his arm around Buffy, "Don't worry, Buffy. We kill vamps together, I think we can make it through detention together, too."

"Okay. Let's just get to class." Willow said.

"Buffy!" Giles said urgently as he emerged from behind a bookshelf.

"Uh, what's up Giles?" Buffy asked, concerned.

"Oh, uh...hello." Giles said nervously, "Um, I would have asked you how patrolling went last night, but then I remembered that you didn't go...have any of you seen Faith?"

"Nah. She-who-slays-vampires-and-is-not-Buffy has not come to see the Xand. Unfortunately." Xander said.

"Er, okay. If you see her, ask her how it went for me, okay?"

"Can do," Buffy said, "alright. Let's go so Mr. Irving can rip out my internal organs." she paused for a moment, "figuratively, of course."

**TO BE CONTINUED...**


	2. Act 1

**Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all of it's associated blah blah belongs to to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy Productions. Grr arrgh.**

**Responsibility is Important: ACT 1  
by Muffyn1**

_Please let him forget to check homework. Please let him forget to check homework. Please let him forget to check homework..._

That's what was going through Buffy's mind as she sat at her desk next to Willow and took out her notebook.

Mr. Irving was obviously a dork in high school, and he still was one now. He didn't have a lot of hair...wait, no, he had exactly no hair. It was just hard to tell because he wore some dopey hat to cover it. His face was fat and his body was scrawny. Put shortly, he was old, ugly, and probably not a very likeable sorta guy.

"Everybody," he said in a grumpy voice, "answer the question on the board."

_Please let him forget to check homework. Please let him forget to-_

"Have your homework on your desks. I'll be around to check."

_Dammit, God! After all the world-saving I've done, you couldn't help me out this one time?_

She watched as he walked down the first row, checking homework as he went.

"Detention," He said when he passed a student who didn't have his homework.

"Detention," Again.

Buffy looked frantically at Willow who was busy answering the question on the board and following the teacher's directions.

"Detention," He said to Xander, who flashed a look that said _oh well _at Buffy.

Irving examined Willow's completed homework and nodded.

Then, the time came. He leaned over Buffy's desk. She opened her mouth to come up with some excuse, but before she could, he said the dreaded three syllables:

"Detention."

Buffy slumped over her desk and sighed. Willow shot her a sorrowful look.

"Great," Buffy said, "there goes any hope I may have had for potential relaxation after school today."

Willow was cheerful (maybe because she wasn't the one with detention), "Well, hey Buff, detentiony doom is more relaxing than world-saving slayery doom, right?"

Buffy eyed Mr. Irving, who was finishing checking the homework of the students in the last row. She turned back to Willow and sighed again, "I'm not so sure anymore."

Later that day, Buffy still felt miserable as they walked into the library for their free period.

"Cheer up, Buff," Xander said, "detention is no match for the Xan-man, so I'm sure the slayer can handle it, too."

"Detention?" the three were greeted by Faith as they entered the library, "Ya see, this is why I dropped out, B."

"I'm just worried about what my mom's gonna say. After my running away fiasco last summer, I'm supposed to be, y'know, trying hard in school. So that I don't get kicked out again." Buffy explained.

"Hey," Faith said, "what your mom doesn't know ain't gonna kill her."

"She didn't know I was the slayer and that almost killed her." Buffy deadpanned.

"This is different." Faith argued.

"You see, Buffy?" Willow said, "Responsibility is important."

Buffy noticed a bandage on Faith's shoulder and indicated it, "Something happen on last night's patrol?"

"Yeah. Looks like we got some new hairy evil brewin'." Faith shrugged, "Ruffed me up a bit, but I showed him who's boss."

"You killed it?"

"Well...no." Faith said, "It got away. I don't think it was anything to worry about. Watcher's a bit more freaked, though."

As if on cue, Giles emerged from his office and pushed up his glasses, "Ah! Buffy. I'll need you to patrol tonight. Faith's been injured and it seems there may be cause for extra precautions."

"Sorry Giles. Can't." Buffy said, "I earned myself a nice, golden detention tonight. I'd have time afterwards, but I do have a lot of homework and I'd rather do that instead of having more detentions tomorrow so they'll all pile up and I'll have no time to do the slaying thing at all and-"

Giles cut off her babble-fest and said, "It's alright, Buffy. I'm sure your studies are far more important than the potential danger to all of our lives." The four teenagers looked at him, confused at the un-Gilesesque comment before he mended, "Okay, I guess when I make deadpan jokes it isn't funny. In all seriousness, Buffy, that's quite alright. I can try to do some research about the demon that injured Faith. You just focus on your schoolwork."

"It's alright, G," Faith said, "I'm fine. I can do the slaying tonight. Besides, I'm the only one who's seen big bad, so I can keep an eye out for it."

"Are you sure?" Giles asked.

Faith nodded.

"And, hey!" Willow said, "Maybe I can tag along? I mean, I've found some really cool defensive spells I wanna try ou-" she looked at Giles, who was eyeing her dangerously, "that I would never, ever use because magick is dangerous and stuff." Willow gulped, "And, uh, I can watch the injured slayer's back. What d'ya say, Giles?"

Giles nodded, "Alright. But, please, both of you, be careful."

The bell rang and Willow, Xander, and Buffy left for their respective classes.

~x~

Later that afternoon, Buffy and Xander walked into Mr. Irving's room, prepared to suffer through whatever Hell he had in store for them.

"Alright," Xander muttered to Buffy, "it's just an extra forty-five minutes of school. How bad could it be?"

They walked in on a nervous Mr. Irving cleaning up something red from one of the desks. As he saw the duo enter, his demeanor changed drastically into one of the grumpy old man they recognized, as he mumbled to himself, "Stupid kids. Spilling their sugary drinks in _my_ classroom."

"How bad?" Buffy whispered back to Xander, "How many apocalypses has it been, now? Take the badness of all of those and multiply it by a big number, because the amount of bored I'm about to be is going to kill me."

~x~

"So I told her that she has to be responsible, and that she can't just copy off my homework all the time. See? I'm being less pushovery! I'm the pushoverer! Like the way you're gonna push over that shoulder-hurting demony thing when you find it!" Willow babbled as she and Faith patrolled the graveyard.

Faith sighed, "Listen, Red, you're cute and everything, but I don't think we're gonna find big and hairy if you keep on yellin' about how we're here to kill 'im."

"Right." Willow said, a little quieter, "So, uh, what'd it look like anyways? The demon?"

"See above:" Faith said, "Big. Hairy."

"Maybe a werewolf?" Willow suggested, "'Cept it's not the full moon..."

"Nah, it wasn't a werewolf. The thing was more like...bigfoot." Faith shrugged, having no better way to describe it.

"Demon bigfoot? That's scary."

"I'll know 'im when I see 'im."

Suddenly, they saw a demon sneaking behind some trees. Upon closer inspection, they could tell that it had a morphed face, almost like a vampire's. It had ape-like hair on its head and body.

"Is that him?" Willow asked.

"That's him." Said Faith.

~x~

"I thought detention was supposed to be 'sit in a room while the teacher gives you the stink eye', not 'sit in a room while he re-teaches the lesson from class today!'" Buffy whispered to Xander.

"If you don't like the way I run my detention, Buffy, I would suggest not getting one in the first place." Irving said to the class, which was surprisingly big for a detention.

Buffy turned to Xander, "That's weird,"

"What?" Xander asked, paying exactly no attention to what Mr. Irving was saying.

"He remembered my name. We've only had him for one class, and he remembered my name."

Xander shrugged, "'Buffy' is a pretty memorable name."

"It's dark out already," Buffy said, "I wish I could be patrolling right now."

~x~

"Oh, no you don't!" Faith yelled at the demon as she sprung into action, beating it up as best she could with her good arm, but she was losing.

"Faith! What do I do?" Willow panicked.

"It's okay, Red! I got this!" But she wasn't so sure.

Willow watched as the demon beat Faith to the ground, and suddenly it occurred to her that the demon was only hitting Faith, and it barely even noticed Willow was there.

Trying out one of her new spells, Willow muttered an incantation as best as she could remember and quickly grabbed Faith. The spell made some sort of invisible forcefield to keep the demon away.

"Good one, Red." Faith praised.

The demon seemed to be retreating, as it began walking away in defeat, but as it put a few yards or so between them, it charged, easily breaking Willow's forcefield.

The demon shoved Willow away. Faith was on the ground, no longer with enough strength to fight the demon.

_It's gonna kill her... _Willow thought.

So she took a deep breath, tackled the demon and muttered a different incantation. Willow's fingers glowed red and the demon screeched in pain. It threw Willow off of it and ran away and soon disappeared into thin air.

"Whoa. Good goin', Will." Faith breathed.

"I t-think he's gone..." Willow looked at Faith in a daze. Her nose was bleeding.

"Red? You okay?" Faith asked before Willow promptly passed out.


End file.
